


Go and be happy but remember (you know well) whom you leave shackled by love

by YondudeUdonta



Category: Hotel Artemis (2018)
Genre: Age Difference, F/F, Im writing this before the movie so obviously inaccurate but yeah, Lesbian Character, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Quoting poetry, Sapphic Imagery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 12:46:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14874000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YondudeUdonta/pseuds/YondudeUdonta
Summary: The nurse remembers those boots well. Remembers unlacing them and tugging them off before they got into bed, before they kissed and made love underneath the soft blankets that Morgan had spent an exorbitant amount on just so she could sleep and feel well rested for her job. That had been the problem.Her job.The fact that she was a cop.





	Go and be happy but remember (you know well) whom you leave shackled by love

**Author's Note:**

> Hi fun fact she doesn't call herself Jean in her head because she hasn't been her for a long time 
> 
> I'm aware it's weird but it's an artistic choice

Everest checks Morgan's vitals while she watches from the doorway.

Her big chunky work boots are tucked neatly side by side under the bed.

The nurse remembers those boots well. Remembers unlacing them and tugging them off before they got into bed, before they kissed and made love underneath the soft blankets that Morgan had spent an exorbitant amount on just so she could sleep and feel well rested for her job. That had been the problem.

Her job.

The fact that she was a cop.

See she, she had been stupid and started catching feelings. She doesn't quite remember when it happened but something about those soft, warm, brown eyes and her laugh, the softness of her skin, the _entirety_ of her. The whole of the sum of her parts had chipped away at the cool, calm, exterior that she had worked so hard to emulate, broken through it like teeth through a fresh grape.

Since when had she started thinking in euphemisms like that?

Probably right around the time she'd realized she was falling for someone 19 years her junior. She'd never been a romantic but Morgan had apparently made one out of her.

"We're finished." Everest says from by the bed, pulling Morgan's shirt back down now that he's finished checking her bruised ribs. She knows there's a lotus tattooed on one side of her rib cage and a violet on the other. They're made up of thin, carefully drawn lines, minimalistic and simple. The lotus had been for the strength she needed to keep pushing, the flowers that bloomed in muddy water, that broke out of it's disgusting surroundings; her childhood had been awful but she had _bloomed_.

The violet she had learned about late in the night (or early in the morning but semantics).

xxx

"What does this mean anyway?" She presses her lips to the violet inked into her skin, licking the sweat off of her skin. The blankets are kicked down at the foot of the bed and she's got her feet shoved under them. Her circulation got shot to shit when she turned forty five and it's even worse ten years later but who wears socks during sex? Morgan makes an inquisitive sound, nurse presses another kiss to her skin.

"You don't know about Sappho?"

"I know _of_ Sappho. Poetry has never been my kinda thing." She shrugs.

"Sappho would give violets as a symbol of her love." She runs her fingers through nurse's graying hair, closes her eyes and recites.

"Go, and be happy but remember (you know well)  
whom you leave shackled by love

If you forget me, think   
of our gifts to Aphrodite   
and all the loveliness that we shared

all the violet tiaras,   
braided rosebuds, dill and   
crocus twined around your young neck..."

She trails off, opening her eyes to look at her. Her free hand curls around nurse's jaw. "Would you accept the violets of my love?" She murmurs in that throaty voice of hers and nurse loses her breath.

xxx

"Be careful." Everest says to her, pulling her from her thoughts. "Don't do something you shouldn't."

"I already have." She smiles wryly. 

Everest leaves them, she moves to stand by Morgan's bed. She explains who she is, what she does, where they are.

"Did you even want to be with me?" Morgan says unthinkingly, tongue loose from the drugs. "I was in falling for you, Jean." Her brown eyes are sad, her hand reaching out to curl around Nurse's wrist.

"Frankly I wish I were dead   
When she left, she wept  
a great deal; she said to me, This parting must be   
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly." 

Jean finishes slides her fingers into Morgan's as she quotes the poem she had memorized in an attempt to remember her by, held the hand of the one who breathed out her name like it was something precious, even now in all this pain.

"I will accept the violets of your love." Jean murmurs. "If you're still willing."

Morgan squeezes her fingers.

"I am."


End file.
